Information & Ethics Committee on Dec. 11th, 2018

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Do you want me to walk you through this? You run a thing called “Scumbag Kathleen Wynne” and you have things that say, “The ugliest...dyke who ever existed” and “I'm surprised that no one has shot her”. I'm asking you, when you run that kind of content.... Personally, I don't care. I'd never vote for Kathleen Wynne in a million years, but when I read that, I think that is about as close to the line as you can get.

Is the tactic to beat the Facebook algorithm to get right up to the line without getting yourself into something that is illegal, to pump the likes? Man, you have a lot of likes there on that campaign.

[Ryan O'Connor]

With respect to the quote you made, Ontario Proud never produced that content. That was a comment that existed on one of the Facebook posts. We do our due diligence to filter out inappropriate, hateful and misogynist commentary. We actually have a—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Misinformation is in the eye of the beholder. Isn't that what you said?

[Ryan O'Connor]

Some persons will call “misinformation” something they just disagree with politically. That's not a fair characterization, in my opinion.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

Thank you, Mr. Angus.

Next up, we have Ms. Fortier for seven minutes.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Mr. O'Connor, my first question concerns your funding.

What type of fundraising is Ontario Proud involved in?

[Ryan O'Connor]

In terms of our fundraising activities, we've solicited donations online, from small donors from across Ontario to larger, more institutional donors who are interested in our messaging. We do a wide variety of fundraising. Sometimes it's just online campaigns where individuals will contribute a few hundred dollars here and there because they support us. Sometimes it's even as little as $10 if they support our message. We do undertake a wide variety of fundraising at Ontario Proud.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Do you use your revenues to raise funds in order to forge ahead? Do you use revenues from donations to fundraise?

[Ryan O'Connor]

The translation said “from nations”; I'm not sure what it meant.

All of the funds that we utilized in Ontario with respect to the provincial election were funds from Ontario entities or individuals.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

What do you do with this money?

[Ryan O'Connor]

We spend it predominantly on advertising. We also have a staff of video producers, so we have to pay their expenses. We have office overhead. There's the advertising aspect. We also have a staff of individuals and human resource needs that need to be funded as well.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

What's the highest amount that you've received?

[Ryan O'Connor]

We've received donations of as little as five dollars and donations in the tens of thousands of dollars.

Just to be clear, madame, our financial disclosure was recently filed with Elections Ontario. They haven't posted it online yet, so I think it would be jumping ahead of things. I can refer members of the committee, if they're interested, to our online filings with Elections Ontario, which will clearly indicate the names of donors—the individuals who have donated—as well as their contribution amounts. That should be available online shortly.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

You could provide this information to the committee. That would be helpful.

How many organizations, companies or individuals are contributing to this? You said that this figure will soon be published, but can you already give us an idea?

[Ryan O'Connor]

I'm doing this off the top of my head because I don't have my list in front of me, so I apologize, madame.

In terms of individual small donors—that would be individuals who are not affiliated with institutions—there would probably be, off the top of my head, several hundred. I would say there were probably about 200. For institutional donors—that would be corporations, for example—there were a smaller number of those, likely about two dozen, approximately.

I'm really approximating, because I don't have—

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

You're talking about private sector companies.

Do you provide services to certain organizations in exchange for contributions?

[Ryan O'Connor]

One can analogize us accepting contributions from persons who like our message to political parties accepting funds from institutions back when it was legal to do so federally.

No, there's no quid pro quo. With respect to Ontario Proud, we accept contributions from people from across Ontario, from institutions and individuals who support our message, but there's certainly no quid pro quo, so to speak.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

You made it clear earlier, but can you confirm that you're not soliciting money outside Canada?

[Ryan O'Connor]

I want to emphasize with the greatest degree of clarity that we never have and never will. Ontario Proud and the Proud organizations are 100% domestically funded and will continue to be. We're frankly, no pun intended, proud of that. We don't need to solicit funds outside of Canada, and we do not want to.

We have strongly advocated against foreign interference in Canadian elections, and that includes foreign interference with respect to data, with respect to political parties and with respect to third parties. We're 100% Canadian and we'll always remain that way.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Do you transfer money to your sister organizations?

[Ryan O'Connor]

No. We're not able to do that because of the various legislative regimes in each of the provinces. Each province has specific campaign and election financing legislation, so each of the Proud organizations is a separately incorporated and separate entity. For example, with respect to Ontario Proud, madame, you'll see funding disclosure shortly. All that funding came from Ontario. It cannot be transferred to another province—for example, British Columbia, which is in an election cycle right now—because that may run afoul of their provincial legislation.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Do you carry out joint fundraising with other sister organizations?

[Ryan O'Connor]

Not with respect to fundraising.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

I'll share the rest of my speaking time with Mr. Erskine-Smith.